Labor on the edge as hung parliament looms

Voters in the key states of New South Wales and Queensland have deserted Labor, with pundits bracing for a long night as the prospect of a hung parliament looms.

Booths across the country are now closed and counting is underway in Western Australia, which is emerging as a key election battleground.

With more than half of the votes counted, Labor has suffered a national two-party preferred swing against it of about 2.6 per cent, but the swing on the primary vote is more than 5 per cent.

The swing against Labor was more than 9 per cent in former prime minister Kevin Rudd's home state of Queensland.

ABC election analyst Antony Green said he expected Labor to lose 13 seats outside Western Australia and gain only McEwen in central Victoria, a scenario which would give the ALP 76 seats.

That would mean that the loss of just one seat in Western Australia - where Hasluck, Stirling and Swan are in play - would make a hung parliament the most likely scenario, with the balance of power being held by three independents and one Green.

Liberal Senator Helen Coonan says WA will determine if any party has a majority.

"Western Australia is going to be absolutely critical. It depends on nothing changing there," she said.

Former ABC journalist Maxine McKew looked like being turfed out after only one term in John Howard's old seat of Bennelong, while 20-year-old Wyatt Roy was set to become Australia's youngest MP, taking the south-east Queensland seat of Longman for the LNP.

Labor's Mike Kelly looked set to hang on to Eden-Monaro, the seat which has traditionally fallen to the party which will form government, while independent Warren Entsch, who retired in 2007, took his old northern Queensland seat of Leichhardt back from the ALP.